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A good article and well articulated! I would change the introduction to be more impartial and not anthropomorphize GPT. It is not smart and it is not skilled i

A good article and well articulated! I would change the introduction to be more impartial and not anthropomorphize GPT. It is not smart and it is not skilled in any tasks other than that for which it is designed. I have the same reservations about the conclusion. The whole middle of the article is good. But to then compare the richness of our human experience to an algorithm that was plainly explained? And then to speculate on whether an algorithm can "think" and if it will "destroy society," weakens the whole article. I really would like to see more technical writing of this sort geared towards a general audience without the speculation and science-fiction pontificating. Good effort!

nitnelave 4y ago
I'm planning on continuing this vulgarization series of "Simply explained", for instance to cover how computers communicate, keep an eye out for them! Regarding the speculation/destroy society, I was directly answering questions that I got from laypeople around me. The consequences on society I don't think are much speculation: it's going to have a big effect on many jobs, just like AI has started to have but much more. For the philosophical questions, I tried to present both sides of the issue to show that it's not just a clear "yes or no": some people will happily argue with you about GPT being smart/skilled/comparable to a human brain. Anyway, it's just an introduction to the questions that you might have about it.
- agentultra 4y ago
  > keep an eye out for them! I will, thank you! :) > Regarding the speculation/destroy society, I was directly answering questions that I got from laypeople around me. I get that. I think it's important in these times that we educate laypersons rather than froth up fears about "AI". It doesn't help, I suppose, that we get questions like this because some lazy billionaire decided to run their mouth off about this or that. Which society then treats like it is news and established fact. I don't think the speculation about consciousness is as well informed as the rest of the article. There is plenty of science and research about it available and its definition extends well beyond humans! Our understanding of what consciousness is is a thoroughly researched topic in psychology, physiology, biology, etc! It's a fascinating area of study. Best of luck and keep up the good work!
prerok 4y ago
I agree that it is a good effort. I don't agree with the criticism. It really depends on who the target audience is. There's been a lot of scare mongering in the news about it lately and I think the last part tries to address that. It first offers an explanation that my parents can understand and then addresses what they have been hearing about in the news. So, I would say it is great to share it with them and I think they are the intended audience.
ryanwaggoner 4y ago
It is not smart and it is not skilled in any tasks other than that for which it is designed. This seems to me to be obviously incorrect, and should be apparent after a few minutes of playing with GPT4. What makes it so powerful is how general-purpose it is, and it can be used for literally an unlimited set of tasks that involve human language. To say that it's not "smart" begs the question of what exactly constitutes smart and when you'll know that an AI has achieved it.
fl7305 4y ago
> it is not skilled in any tasks other than that for which it is designed. But it wasn't designed. It's not a computer program, where one can make confident predictions about its limitations based on the source code. It's a very large black box. It was trained on guessing the next word. Does that fact alone prove that it cannot have evolved certain internal structures during the training? Do you claim that an artificial neural network with trillions of neurons can never be intelligent, no matter the structure? Or is the claim that this particular neural network with trillions of neurons is not intelligent? If so, what is the reasoning? > It is not smart "Not smart" = "not able to reason intelligently". Is that a falsifiable claim? What would the empirical test look like that would show us if the claim is correct or not? Look, I realize that "GPT-4 is intelligent" is an extraordinary claim that requires extraordinary evidence. But I think we're starting to see such extraordinary evidence, illustrated by the examples below. https://openai.com/research/gpt-4 https://openai.com/research/gpt-4 (For instance, the "Visual inputs" section) Microsoft AI research: Many convincing examples, summarized with: "The central claim of our work is that GPT-4 attains a form of general intelligence, indeed showing sparks of artificial general intelligence. This is demonstrated by its core mental capabilities (such as reasoning, creativity, and deduction), its range of topics on which it has gained expertise (such as literature, medicine, and coding), and the variety of tasks it is able to perform (e.g., playing games, using tools, explaining itself, ...)." https://arxiv.org/abs/2303.12712 https://arxiv.org/abs/2303.12712
- agentultra 4y ago
  > It's a very large black box. It was trained on guessing the next word. Does that fact alone prove that it cannot have evolved certain internal structures during the training? Yes. There is interesting work to formalize these black boxes to be able to connect what was generated back to its inputs. There’s no need to ascribe any belief that they can evolve, modify themselves, or spontaneously develop intelligence. As far as I’m aware no man made machine has ever exhibited the ability to evolve. > Do you claim that an artificial neural network with trillions of neurons can never be intelligent, no matter the structure? If, by structure, you mean some algorithm and memory layout in a modern computer I think this sounds like a reasonable claim. NN, RNN, etc are super, super cool. But they’re not magic. And what I’m arguing in this thread is that people who don’t understand the maths and research are making wild claims about AGI that are not justified. > Look, I realize that "GPT-4 is intelligent" is an extraordinary claim that requires extraordinary evidence. That’s the crux of it.
unethical_ban 4y ago
This site talks *constantly* about the impact of the Internet, the Information Age and social media on society, and its negative effects especially in the case of the third. I think being incredibly concerned about societal stability in the face of such rapid dissolving of our ability to trust our senses, combined with social media, is a valid response.

nitnelave 4y ago

I'm planning on continuing this vulgarization series of "Simply explained", for instance to cover how computers communicate, keep an eye out for them! Regarding the speculation/destroy society, I was directly answering questions that I got from laypeople around me. The consequences on society I don't think are much speculation: it's going to have a big effect on many jobs, just like AI has started to have but much more. For the philosophical questions, I tried to present both sides of the issue to show that it's not just a clear "yes or no": some people will happily argue with you about GPT being smart/skilled/comparable to a human brain. Anyway, it's just an introduction to the questions that you might have about it.

agentultra 4y ago
> keep an eye out for them! I will, thank you! :) > Regarding the speculation/destroy society, I was directly answering questions that I got from laypeople around me. I get that. I think it's important in these times that we educate laypersons rather than froth up fears about "AI". It doesn't help, I suppose, that we get questions like this because some lazy billionaire decided to run their mouth off about this or that. Which society then treats like it is news and established fact. I don't think the speculation about consciousness is as well informed as the rest of the article. There is plenty of science and research about it available and its definition extends well beyond humans! Our understanding of what consciousness is is a thoroughly researched topic in psychology, physiology, biology, etc! It's a fascinating area of study. Best of luck and keep up the good work!

prerok 4y ago

I agree that it is a good effort. I don't agree with the criticism. It really depends on who the target audience is. There's been a lot of scare mongering in the news about it lately and I think the last part tries to address that. It first offers an explanation that my parents can understand and then addresses what they have been hearing about in the news. So, I would say it is great to share it with them and I think they are the intended audience.

ryanwaggoner 4y ago

It is not smart and it is not skilled in any tasks other than that for which it is designed. This seems to me to be obviously incorrect, and should be apparent after a few minutes of playing with GPT4. What makes it so powerful is how general-purpose it is, and it can be used for literally an unlimited set of tasks that involve human language. To say that it's not "smart" begs the question of what exactly constitutes smart and when you'll know that an AI has achieved it.

fl7305 4y ago

> it is not skilled in any tasks other than that for which it is designed. But it wasn't designed. It's not a computer program, where one can make confident predictions about its limitations based on the source code. It's a very large black box. It was trained on guessing the next word. Does that fact alone prove that it cannot have evolved certain internal structures during the training? Do you claim that an artificial neural network with trillions of neurons can never be intelligent, no matter the structure? Or is the claim that this particular neural network with trillions of neurons is not intelligent? If so, what is the reasoning? > It is not smart "Not smart" = "not able to reason intelligently". Is that a falsifiable claim? What would the empirical test look like that would show us if the claim is correct or not? Look, I realize that "GPT-4 is intelligent" is an extraordinary claim that requires extraordinary evidence. But I think we're starting to see such extraordinary evidence, illustrated by the examples below. https://openai.com/research/gpt-4 https://openai.com/research/gpt-4 (For instance, the "Visual inputs" section) Microsoft AI research: Many convincing examples, summarized with: "The central claim of our work is that GPT-4 attains a form of general intelligence, indeed showing sparks of artificial general intelligence. This is demonstrated by its core mental capabilities (such as reasoning, creativity, and deduction), its range of topics on which it has gained expertise (such as literature, medicine, and coding), and the variety of tasks it is able to perform (e.g., playing games, using tools, explaining itself, ...)." https://arxiv.org/abs/2303.12712 https://arxiv.org/abs/2303.12712

agentultra 4y ago
> It's a very large black box. It was trained on guessing the next word. Does that fact alone prove that it cannot have evolved certain internal structures during the training? Yes. There is interesting work to formalize these black boxes to be able to connect what was generated back to its inputs. There’s no need to ascribe any belief that they can evolve, modify themselves, or spontaneously develop intelligence. As far as I’m aware no man made machine has ever exhibited the ability to evolve. > Do you claim that an artificial neural network with trillions of neurons can never be intelligent, no matter the structure? If, by structure, you mean some algorithm and memory layout in a modern computer I think this sounds like a reasonable claim. NN, RNN, etc are super, super cool. But they’re not magic. And what I’m arguing in this thread is that people who don’t understand the maths and research are making wild claims about AGI that are not justified. > Look, I realize that "GPT-4 is intelligent" is an extraordinary claim that requires extraordinary evidence. That’s the crux of it.

unethical_ban 4y ago

This site talks *constantly* about the impact of the Internet, the Information Age and social media on society, and its negative effects especially in the case of the third. I think being incredibly concerned about societal stability in the face of such rapid dissolving of our ability to trust our senses, combined with social media, is a valid response.